


We're Here For Him

by thepizzaman



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Agoraphobia, Alternate Universe - Crack, Avengers Family, Crack Treated Seriously, Drunken Shenanigans, Fluff and Angst, Gen, I hate myself why did I write this, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, also pepper is a cat, and way too much money, cause I said so mother fuckers, for whatever reason, tony has agoraphobia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-14
Updated: 2016-03-14
Packaged: 2018-05-26 15:11:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6244702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thepizzaman/pseuds/thepizzaman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pepper is a cat, Tony has severe agoraphobia, Clint is someone’s frumpy uncle, Natasha hands people things, Bucky is the magic coffee man, and Steve is the new guy. Things go downhill quickly.</p><p>In which Tony isn’t Tony Stark, master of death or whatever, Just a really rich guy with too much time on his hands and too little space in his brain for anything other than science. He’s a nerd, a jerk, a billionaire, a genius, but most importantly, he’s fragile as shit. People deal with it somehow and things might get worse before they get better but at least Tony can pull the blinds back now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We're Here For Him

**Author's Note:**

> The avengers are Tony's wide array of personal assistance/people he pays to call themselves his friends because he hasn’t stepped outside his house in years. The one time he does, when Nat is god knows where and Bucky is maybe dead, he meats a giant health nut named Steve in desperate need of a job and a hobby. Tony provides both, somehow. 
> 
> this is my first (published) fanfic like...ever. So whatever, hope you like it. I literally just meshed together my imagination with the very few things in canon I actually like and trashed the rest. It works out though, I guess. 
> 
> Anyway, enjoy!

 

The First Time Steve see’s Tony stark, the genius billionaire, when he’s not drunk on the TV, he’s grocery shopping at 3:30 in the morning after a long shift at the VA and he thinks the sleep is getting to him, making him hallucinate. Because you just don’t _see_ Tony Stark in public, the man’s barely left his house in _years_ , and he certainly wouldn’t be shopping in mini-mart, a trashy ethnic grocer in mid-town Brooklyn.

 The rich man had enough food stacked in his cart to look like he was shopping for a family of ten; noodles, soup, sushi, chocolate, alcohol, noodles, soup, sushi, alcohol. A set of pliers? A small propane tank, reading glasses and a six pack of coke.

 The moment the other man saw Steve, he veered off into a different isle, and continued to ping pong around the store to avoid the only other human there. Steve never got a good view of the man, only his sketchy appearance and loaded cart with one very anxious squeaky wheel.

 Steve, being the good, mindful and not at all nosey man he was, chose to engage the mystery man in a stalker-ish game of ‘which isle can you catch me in next without seaming creepy’ tag. The small glimpses Steve got, he could see the strangers dress matched his flaky shopping style and college-esque cart contents. He was wearing dark red sunglasses that covered the half of his face not guarded by a blue ball cap and a puffy hoodie tucked into a leather jacket, zipped up halfway to conceal and dark black ac/dc shirt. High top sneakers under skinny jeans that hugged his ass tighter than a watertight second skin. He wore fingerless gloves and only touched what he absolutely had to. The man look terrified. 

 He was mysterious, short, he had odd posture and he hummed loudly to himself as he shopped. All in all it was a very 3:30 in the morning type encounter and that childish curiosity was getting under Steve’s skin. Who knew what kind of adventure the man had hidden under his hoodie or stuffed away in the terrorist-y duffle bag sitting in the child basket area of his cart?

 Eventually their awkward tango, shopping around each other, ended as they both rounded the corner for the self check out register, Stark and his emotional grocery luggage wheeling up just before Steve, occupying the only functional and non threatening empty isle.

 Steve was standing behind him at the self-checkout registers, trying very had not to look at the guy’s sculpted ass. It was a glorious ass, one of a kind, and his jutted posture made it peg out even farther and Steve was lucky the classic American gentleman in him was standing tall in the face of such an amazing evil.

 From where Steve stood, he could see the exquisite man’s hand shake as he tapped angrily on the frustrating little screen and the women’s voice continuously chanted, “please remove last item from the bagging area and scan it”.

 To be honest, it was actually hilarious, and if it weren’t for his better judgment Steve would’ve just sat back and watched the expensive smelling man –as a side note yes, he could smell the cologne from here, no he wasn’t leaning in and being creepy - struggle with such a mundane thing as an electronic register.

 “Do you need some help, there?” Steve spoke up, he watched Stark's hand shaking increased as he drew back and stepped aside.

 “Outsmarted by my own damn groceries.” Stark mumbled more to himself than to Steve, allowing the buffer man to gently shove him aside and take over.

 “The trick is to have a little patients.”

 He heard the man’s huff of disapproval, but continued on nonetheless.

 Steve carefully pressed the 'cancel item' button and 'selected all', removing prestige eco-friendly cotton bags and all their contents, placing them back in the cart. He then proceeded to empty the bags and place each one of the 5 on the little weight next to the scanner, feeling the wandering gaze of his past-midnight stranger observe him in this process and imagined all the thoughts running through his mind.

Once Steve placed all the empty bags in their rightful spot, the little screen beeped an the women’s voice asked ‘are you using your own bags?’ After softly tapping yes, the electric cashier proceeded to restart it and Steve began re-scanning all of the items

“Just gotta take it slow.” He smiled.

Stark said nothing, only continued to watch in amazement as this kind, attractive stranger checked out his entire cart of food and suspicious assorted items like he was doing a ‘helping the elderly’ badge for a girl scouts project.

 

“There we go!” Steve finished, placing his hands graciously on his hips, facing the skeptical glaring of Tony Stark, glasses and hood removed, standing flabbergasted next to him, hands in his pockets.

 

Stark stepped forward silently, finished the payment and loading both hands with full bags. Steve felt his stomach drop and flip at the same time. He’d just bagged Tony Stark’s groceries. This’ll be a story to tell Sam.

 

The billionaire gathered his bags and was about to walk away and there was no thank you, no smile, and not even a little gracious eye contact. He would have preferred anything to the awkward silence that settled over them both, even though Stark seamed to appreciate it. He gathered the duffle bag off the cart and Steve could see something moving in it, maybe a sentient bomb or some other weird tech he would never hear about, his daze was unshaking, settled on the black bag’s movement, totally forgetting the very rich I-really-shouldn’t-go-anywhere-without-a-body-guard man staring at him. Just as Stark started speaking again, Steve found himself glaring into the round, golden eyes of a little blonde cat with the words 'service animal' strung around it's neck on a bedazzled collar.

 

“Quit your day job.”

 

Steve’s head whipped back up to Tony.

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“Quit your day job, come work for me.”

 

Suddenly there was a hand outstretch to him with a little blank card in it, Steve took it and examined the white square with nothing on it, no name, no company not even a phone number, just a street address. Steve looked back up at the man, only to see him already retreating out the store doors with a smug glance behind him.

 

“Call this number say your here for a job interview, Jarvis will give you an address, come see me?”

 

The strange man, dubbed a genius, and his cat turned on his heals and wheeled away - leaving Steve and his energy drinks alone, in a speechless shock. The only sound was the soft snoring of a clerk at his counter.

**Author's Note:**

> Good? I might keep this going might not, depends on my motivation and schedule. I'm very busy ya know, sleeping eating and ignoring emails, taxing work. 
> 
> Also sorry this chapter is really fucking short, I'm just kind of testing the waters, the next chapter will definitely be longer and better written lmao.
> 
> leave your comments in the comment section and yell at me if you want. Spite keeps my soul alive.
> 
> This is totally un-beta'd so, if you see any issues I'm sure there's a lot just lemme know, and if you wanna beta it I ain't gonna stop you.


End file.
